Twelve candidates for the post of special envoy to the Sahara rejected, Antonio Guterres

On May 22, 2019, the UN secretary-general's personal envoy for Western Sahara Horst Köhler submitted his resignation for «health reasons». Since then the post remained vacant. 

During these twenty-four months, the parties rejected twelve candidates, revealed Antonio Guterres on Friday, May 7, without giving further details, AFP correspondent at the UN in New York reported on Twitter.

Guterres explained that the delay in appointing a successor to the former German president is not due to a lack of efforts on his part.

Among the names suggested are the Australian Julie Bishop, the Slovak Miroslav Lajcak, the former Romanian Prime Minister Petre Roman and the Portuguese Louis Amado. 

And since April 30, the Italian Staffan de Mistura has been added to the list of candidates.